Waste glass in concrete could be used for construction

In the wake of the now infamous Four Corners report on the state of Australia’s glass recycling industry, University of Melbourne researchers have announced their work incorporating waste glass into prefabricated concrete structures.

The researchers claim that finely ground recycled glass in concrete is a viable replacement for sand and existing supplementary material like fly ash and ground-down slag from blast furnaces, with team member Dr Ali Kashani noting that glass can be ground down to particles of similar size to cement and fly ash.

“In the short term, we are confident that adding glass to concrete will allow us to build strong, light and durable non-load-bearing walls with a reasonably high portion of recycled glass,” said Dr Kashani. “Our work has shown it has excellent sound, thermal insulation and fire-resistant characteristics.

“We are looking forward to working with the cement and concrete industries and building standard regulators to prove the viability of using these products in traditional concrete structures.”

Damien Crough, founding director and board chair of prefabAUS, is all in favour of upgrading building standards to allow glass in concrete, noting that existing concrete supplementary materials are “becoming harder to get and more expensive”.

“The cost of glass will be an attractive factor for industry as it is readily available and inexpensive, being about a third of the cost of fine sand or less.

“The opportunities for a wide range of projects, and the environment, are enormous.”

The research has been funded by Sustainability Victoria and the Australian Packaging Covenant.

Image caption: Damian Crough, Assoc Prof Tuan Ngo and Dr Ali Kashani in the lab with a block of glass-impregnated concrete.